We tell our children unsettling fairy tales to teach them valuable lessons, but these Cautionary Tales are for the education of the grown ups – and they are all true. Tim Harford (Financial Times, BBC, author of “The Data Detective”) brings you stories of awful human error, tragic catastrophes, and hilarious fiascos. They'll delight you, scare you, but also make you wiser. New episodes every other Friday.
136 episodes transcribedAir traffic controllers are meant to stop aircrafts from flying into one another... and if they fail, computer systems are installed to warn pilots of...
Cautionary Conversation: When a small-town detective gets a tip about a missing woman, he believes he's uncovered a highly-trained chameleon: a foreig...
In the early 90s, cutting-edge advertising agency Chiat/Day announced a radical plan, aimed at giving the company a jolt of creative renewal. They wou...
With the 95th Academy Awards just around the corner, Tim Harford looks back at a basic lesson. Galileo tried to teach us that adding more and more lay...
Cautionary Conversation: Celebrated physicist Professor Paul Frampton was on his way to Brussels to meet the love of his life, swimwear model Denise M...
Steve Jobs called It “the most amazing piece of technology since the PC.” According to Jeff Bezos It was not only “revolutionary,” but infinitely comm...
A hundred years ago, the Tomb of the Pharaoh Tutankhamun was officially opened - despite the widely held belief that disturbing the remains of the Egy...
Golden sparks are raining down on the Great Lafayette’s famous vaudeville show, “The Lion’s Bride”. They look like they’re part of the performance. Th...
Recorded before an audience at the Bristol Festival of Economics (11/17/2022) The Dutch went so potty over tulip bulbs in the 1600s that many were rui...
As a special New Year treat we're presenting two Cautionary Tales Shorts - which have previously only been available to paying Apple and Pushkin+ subs...
This week, we’re sharing an episode of Imaginary Worlds. For the last 30 years, the real world has been catching up to Neal Stephenson’s vision of the...
More than 100,000 families - many of them amongst the poorest in Britain - put money aside for Christmas gifts and other seasonal treats in a savings...
There are eight American turkeys painted on the walls of Schleswig's Cathedral of St Peter - which is odd... since the frescoes were created two centu...
In a crisis most people respond with decency and solidarity. The bombing of British cities in the Second World War did not cause society to crumble as...
Thomas Midgley's inventions caused his own death, hastened the deaths of millions of people around the world, and very nearly extinguished all life on...
Candy laced with cyanide and needles in marshmallows, we've long been warned to be suspicious of the sweet treats handed out by strangers at Halloween...
Charlie Veitch was certain that 9/11 was an inside job. The attack on the World Trade Center wasn't the work of Al-Qaeda, but an elaborate conspiracy....
This week, it's an episode from Warfare, a podcast from our friends at History Hit. It's 1942. The year Anne Frank and her family went into hiding dur...
Single and looking for love, Dr Robert Epstein found himself chatting with a slim, attractive brunette online. She seemed perfect... perhaps even too...
Inventor Franz Reichelt wants to test his novel "parachute suit" from as tall a structure as possible - and the Eiffel Tower seems ideal. Previous tri...
